Current affairs

The more my agnostic mind ponders Mitt Romney's Faith in America speech, the more I get irritated by it. It's nonsensical – his notion that the United States is threatened by a "religion of secularism." I only wish. This country is one of the most overtly religious in the world. We vie with Saudi Arabia and other super-fundamentalist nations for the dishonor of having the most religious crazies per capita. Yesterday I said on my Church of the Churchless blog that Mitt Romney's weird religion is relevant to voters. His chosen faith, Mormonism, is strange even by religious standards. It's…

Oh, man. A 4' 9" guy with a missing left hand just wrestled me into forking over $100 to him. Ordinarily that'd bother my macho sensibility, but last night I was happy to be bested by Steve Novick, who is a Democratic candidate for Oregon Senator Gordon Smith's seat. When the phone rang at 6:45 pm, just ten minutes before we had to leave for a neighborhood association meeting, and as I was about to bite into some rice and lentils, I was prepared to abruptly dismiss the caller. But when I heard, "This is Steve Novick," I figured the…

Christmas has arrived early for those, like me, who love it when gay-bashing conservatives turn out to be – take a guess – gay. Or at least, bi-sexual. Today's Idaho Statesman newspaper has a tell-all story, "More gay men describe sexual encounters with U.S. Sen. Craig." David Phillips. Mike Jones. Greg Ruth. Tom Russell. Four gay men, willing to put their names in print and whose allegations can't be disproved, have come forward since news of U.S. Sen. Larry Craig's guilty plea. They say they had sex with Craig or that he made a sexual advance or that he paid…

Yes, there's a lot to be thankful for on this day before Thanksgiving. But cruelty to animals isn't one of them. A few nights ago we watched HBO's "I Am an Animal: The Story of Ingrid Newkirk and PETA." It showed many disturbing scenes, including what goes on in a turkey slaughterhouse. Believe me, if you watched that secretly-filmed footage before you sat down to devour your "bird" tomorrow, most likely you wouldn't have an appetite. Don't believe me. Watch on a PETA web site. Or on the viewer below. Here's another disturbing video of how turkeys arrive on dinner…

By and large, it was pretty damn frustrating to watch General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker on C-Span today as they spread their exquisitely fashioned B.S. over a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Iraq. When I first heard about the Move On "General Petraeus or General Betray Us?" ad, I thought it was over the top. But after seeing Petraeus testify before Congress I give the ad a thumbs up. He's got a reputation for being an independent straight-shooter, above politics. Well, I didn't hear him say anything that wasn't straight out of the Bush administration party line. That isn't…

Driving home from central Oregon today I tuned to OPB just in time to hear the results of a survey that cast new light on the sex life of seniors. I turned up the car radio, not because my youthful 58 year old ears have any difficulty hearing. Rather, I was interested in learning about the carnal proclivities of an age group that, Tao willing, I would enter one day. Old people, I thought, twisting the volume knob. Got to keep up on what's going on with them so I'll know what to expect when I become one. Then I…

Today's headline says it all: "Violence Rages in Iraq as Sunni Bloc Leaves Cabinet." Um, wasn't the surge supposed to produce a quell in violence that would let the Iraqi government pursue national reconciliation? We've got a fool for a commander-in-chief. Four US soldiers were killed yesterday because of Bush's idiocy. The madness has to stop.

This piece of student art on display at the Portland airport looks just fine to me. Cynically titled "In God We Trust" by its creator, Peter Nichols, it points to the absurdity of our soldiers dying in Iraq for oil. Instead of stars, the flag has dollar signs. But easily offended Oregonian columnist David Reinhard says this is anti-American propaganda. No, David, it's truth-telling. Your patron saint, George Bush, is the anti-American here, since he – along with his neo-con cronies – have trashed the Constitution and our nation's values to further their selfish political ends. Last I looked, the…

Every year I look forward to reading Regence Blue Cross' "Re: Your Annual Plan Renewal" letter. Not because I like the news about how much more money they'll be sucking out of our checking account every month. No, I enjoy seeing what half-assed excuses our health insurance provider came up with this time to justify their exorbitant premium increase. For 2006-07, it was 12.5%. For 2005-06, 11.8%. Inflation has been running around three percent, right?. So how does Regence explain the extra 9% or so? Pretty poorly. The cost of health care – hospitalizations, doctors' services, prescriptions, diagnostic tests –…

Governor Kulongoski and the Democrat-dominated state legislature did a lot of good things this year. But the decision to allow volunteer hunters to kill cougars with the help of dogs was atrocious for several reasons. First, it subverts the clear intent of the voters, who twice passed a measure that prohibits the use of bait and dogs in hunting cougars and bears. So what if a hunter has a free pass to get out of Measure 18 from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife? Unfortunately, the voter-approved law allows cougars to be killed by a state agency. The writers…

Feeling like Bob Dylan's ballad, all I know is something is happening here –with women's bodies– and I don't know what it is. It's a pleasure to pay close attention to this cultural issue, though. Really close attention. A few days ago I read a story in the Oregonian about the collarbone's ascension as a focus of female beauty. The piece originated in the New York Times as "The Collarbone's Connected to Slimness": "As the rest of women's bodies recede in spring fashions, the clavicles, or collarbones, and the upper chest between them, is rising to prominence. Toned shoppers who…

All religions are weird. They ask us to believe in gods that can't be known, in dogma that can't be proven, in revelations that can't be duplicated. So how weird does a religious belief have to be before it screams to voters, "Anyone who subscribes to this bullshit isn't qualified to be president of the United States?" That's Mitt Romney's problem. He's a Republican candidate for president. A Mormon. And Mormons believe in some of the absolutely weirdest stuff. Like, that in 1827 Joseph Smith dug up some golden plates in New York that had been protected by an angel…

It was a quiet day on the Metolius River in central Oregon yesterday. Well, all the days are. Cell phone reception is blessedly non-existent. The Bend Bulletin was way late in being delivered to the Camp Sherman store, so I biked two miles from our cabin for nothing. Which was just fine with me. "Nothing" on the Metolius is far, far better than the everything that clutters the mind and heart out in the unnatural world. We biked down to the end of the road in the afternoon. I stood for quite a while tuning into this horse standing in…

Yes, it's a tragedy. Thirty-three people dead, including the gunman. But in Iraq, this number of killings would be a good day. And in Darfur, a miracle to have only that many lives lost on a Monday in April. Listening to the radio in my car this afternoon, I heard a reporter say that decades from now, the Virginia Tech tragedy would still be on the minds of Americans. I doubt it. And also, I hope not. There are many more important things to be focusing on than a massacre by one crazed man. Like the thousands of people being…

Memo to Oregon legislators: if you invite the public to testify at a hearing, be willing to hear them. Especially if they've driven several hours to attend an 8:00 am session on SB 30, a bill that would protect the fragile Metolius River basin from two large destination resorts. That's what happened last Thursday. The public got stiffed, while government officials and real estate developers got to talk…and talk…and talk some more. I was there, one of the non-testifiers. Like several dozen other people who wanted a couple of minutes in front of the Education and General Government Committee, chaired…

I've already argued persuasively that Randi Rhodes is an embarrassment to progressives. Now I'm running out of adjectives. What's worse than "embarrassment"? Words fail me. Yesterday I opted to test my teeth-gritting ability and tuned to Portland's Air America station, KPOJ, while she was on. I heard some amazing news: Dick Cheney said they have lawyers looking into whether the 22nd Amendment is inoperative, and George Bush could run for a third term. Wow! What a scoop. That was the first I'd heard about this astounding revelation. Rhodes went on to express her outrage about how the administration was set…

Short-sighted greed is poised to wreck the marvelous Metolius basin. It makes me sick. But there's something you and I can do about it: support Senate Bill 30, which would prohibit destination resorts in or within three miles of the basin. Laurel and I are part owners of a forest service cabin on the Metolius. It's the most beautiful river I've ever seen. The fly fishing is incomparable. The banks are wonderfully walkable. And you can even pause on your stroll and enjoy a latte at the oh-so-charming Camp Sherman store. The permanent population of Camp Sherman is about 200.…

At the start you could almost see Martha MacCallum, the blondilicious Fox News anchor, licking her right-wing chops. Ooh, goody! An interview with the makers of "Manufacturing Dissent," an exposé of Michael Moore. It's going to be juicy! Well, it was. But not in the way MacCallum intended. I had a sense that film makers Rick Caine and Debbie Melnyk weren't going to toe the Fox line when Melnyk began by referring to themselves as "good lefties from Canada." They set out to make a positive movie about Michael Moore, being admirers of both his work and politics. Eventually, though,…

Ignorant intolerance, what is your name? This week it's "Gen. Peter Pace," chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who believes that homosexuality is as immoral as adultery. It's also the Portland Oregonian columnist David Reinhard, who strongly supported Pace's religious bigotry in his "Tolerance or Approval?" piece a few days ago. Homophobes do their best to ignore science, just as global warming deniers and intelligent design advocates do. But the truth has a way of sliding through even the most closed-off minds. Consider the case of Rev. Rob Schenck, a prominent evangelical leader, who came to the conclusion that…

Pop quiz: how many people have been killed by a cougar in Oregon? Is it (a) 126, (b) 18, or (c) none. From all the hysteria over "managing" the cougar population (which really means needlessly killing them), you'd think the answer would be greater than zero. But it isn't. No one has ever been killed by a cougar in Oregon. Many people have been killed by hunters. So if we're really concerned about protecting human life, there should be a thinning of the ranks of hunters, not of cougars. As I've noted before, the Oregon cougar plan is based on…